St-Pierre is preparing for his long awaited return to the Octagon, which will go down on November 4th at UFC 217, against Mr. Bisping. The former welterweight champ has worked with Roach in the past, and a couple of weeks ago, St-Pierre revealed that he was the trainer’s Wild Card Boxing Club again.

Well, on a recent episode of the “Believe You Me” podcast, the middleweight champ had this to say about GSP’s boxing regiment (quotes via MMA Fighting):

“I know [Georges] is a good wrestler, he’s a strong guy. He’s working with Freddie Roach which I couldn’t give a s**t about to be honest. . . I’m really not concerned about what he’s gonna do or what [Roach] is gonna improve him on and I hope that he improves his boxing to where Georges wants to stand and have a boxing fight with me. I hope he does that.

“The only way he wins this fight is by taking me down and holding me down or getting the submission because he ain’t winning on the feet and he knows that.”

“What you’ve got to remember is that Georges is no idiot. He’s really not. He’s a very intelligent guy and his approach to the game has always been an intelligent approach. He knows what he’s doing. He’s been preparing for this for a long, long time. All this year he’s been preparing for it and probably the year before that. . .”

Bisping is probably right, in that GSP will very likely look to take it down at some point. While St-Pierre has underrated striking – his jab is outstanding for example – it would be very surprising if he spent a lot of time trading with Bisping on his feet. Of course, he’ll need his striking game to set up a takedown, as Bisping’s wrestling defense is no joke.

It’s going to be an interesting night. If you missed it, earlier today the UFC announced that UFC 217 will also feature Joanna Jedrzejczyk versus Rose Namajunas.